Going Green4Good Is About More Than The Environment

Sustainability Compugen’s Green4Good Service not only brings sustainability to your business, but also does good for the community as well.

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f an enterprise is committed to making itself sustainable, more options exist for it than ever before.

Adopting green IT practices, like asset re-use, have hidden advantages. Top IT solutions and services provider Compugen is at the forefront of this movement. Their Green4Good program collects and refurbishes end-of-first-life IT assets from Canadian businesses for re-use.

Compugen Finance’s President, Steve Glover, is Green4Good’s architect. Since launching in 2009, the program has diverted upwards of one million IT assets from landfills. After being loaded with licensed Microsoft operating systems, the refurbished assets are then resold to support financially constrained charities. Green4Good has helped more than 100 charities, including the Massey Centre, which supports and empowers pregnant and parenting teens.

Refurbished IT assets give new life to those in need

“Technology was an area we never had enough of,” says Massey Centre CEO Ekua Asabea Blair. “Our partnership with Compugen started in 2009. Back then we were using 10-year-old computers that were slow and ineffective. Green4Good came in with restored IT and gave us new life.”

Compugen and the Massey Centre’s primary goal was to ensure young women attending high school classes had laptops. “It’s not a story about one person here,” says Asabea Blair. “It’s about women being more focused. There was added motivation amongst the students and we saw attendance rise.” Through Green4Good’s support last year, the Massey Centre saw the highest number of women graduating high school in nearly a decade. All of the graduates are currently pursuing post-secondary education.

“We are so grateful,” Asabea Blair shares. “There’s no way we would have ever found the money for that technology on our own. I applaud those groups that are a part of this practice and encourage more to do
the same.”

Technology giants partner to build a greener future

2015 was a pivotal year for Compugen’s Green4Good program, removing over 100,000 assets nationally to raise several hundred thousand dollars for needy charities.

These results caught the attention of Fortune 500 technology giant Lenovo. Thrilled with their evaluation of the Green4Good program, Lenovo became an advocate and partner of Compugen. “We focus on innovation that matters,” says Stefan Bockhop, Lenovo Canada’s Director of Channels.

“The Green4Good program provides our mutual customers a financially beneficial, environmentally conscious way to close the lifecycle on their hardware.”

Glover has already set Compugen on the path for its next green initiative. In the near future they will offer carbon credits to companies that want to reduce their carbon footprint — a practice being utilized by more and more high-profile organizations, the Vatican included. In Glover’s estimation, carbon offsetting programs are a key to unlocking a sustainable future.

“The next generation is growing up with a nip-it-in-the-bud-now attitude and that’s what Compugen is doing. We’re a pioneer in green IT practices — a field that will get bigger and better as awareness of its impact continues to grow."